Esteban Ocon fires F1 title warning to Hamilton, Verstapp and Leclerc | F1 | Sports

Red Bull, Ferrari and Mercedes have dominated Formula 1 for the better part of 20 years, but Esteban Ocon is intent on upsetting the sport’s establishment. The Frenchman has finished among the top 10 in only one of his four full seasons to date but is confident he can one day top the pile.

It was only in 2019 that Ocon’s F1 aspirations were put in doubt after he spent the season as a reserve driver for Mercedes. The 25-year-old had lost his seat at Racing Point to Lance Stroll, but he rejoined F1’s ranks with Renault—who later rebranded as Alpine—in 2020.

Team-mate Fernando Alonso clinched back-to-back world championships while on Renault’s books in 2005 and 2006. The French manufacturer has struggled to produce the same kind of challenge in recent years, but Ocon has said he believes Alpine can compete for top honours , adding he “would not be here” unless he felt that was the case.

“You know, my aim is to be world champion one day, I’m not here to sit around and just participate in the race. I mean, for that, it doesn’t matter to me,” he said during a recent appearance on Beyond the Grid. “No, what I want is to create more memories, like we got that win in Budapest [in 2021]that podium in Bahrain, that podium in Qatar, with Fernando.

“I mean, if you ask Fernando, he will be the same. That is the ambition of Laurent Rossi [Alpine CEO]that is the ambition of Luca de Meo [Renault CEO] and Otmar Szafnauer [Alpine team boss] as well, in all the bosses from the team, they share those ambitions, and they want to progress and get to the top. And it’s not the same in every team. And yeah, I’m fully on board with that project.”

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen recently took the lead in the drivers’ standings after Ferrari ace Charles Leclerc led for the first five races of the year. Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton, meanwhile, has been stunted in his bid for a record-breaking eighth world title and sits sixth in the table.